On Wednesday the World Cup reached its halfway stage, Australia and the Netherlands playing the 24th of its 48 matches, and its shape and character, initially as hazy as if seen from a distance through the blanket of smog that sits above many of its venues, is starting to become clear – and quite compelling. If these are indeed the end of days for this increasingly marginalised format, it might have quite the death mask.
It was England who really got it going. India’s dominance has driven engagement, but the champions’ collapse has been its most compelling subplot. If they have achieved nothing else – and they pretty much have achieved nothing else – then by losing to Afghanistan, England provided the tournament with the animating defibrillation of its first great shock. By then, Australia had lost their first two games to be cast into apparently short-lived crisis, India had just played their massively anticipated match against Pakistan, and two days later the Netherlands upset previously in-form South Africa. It had taken a while, but the tournament was up and running.
